


thief

by grey_dawn



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, First Kiss, First Love, Fluff and Humor, My First Work in This Fandom, One Shot, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Tratie, tagging is pretty annoying, written two years ago
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 07:21:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12812502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grey_dawn/pseuds/grey_dawn
Summary: travis stoll and katie gardner grow with the years. first they grow in parallel, then apart, then closer, before katie snatches travis' heart like an apple off a tree — from right under his nose, too.





	thief

**Author's Note:**

> a cute one-shot about travis and katie from PJO. i actually found this from maybe two years ago, and it's one of my more coherent fics, so i edited it and here it is! i haven't really thought about this couple or fandom for a while, actually!  
> i hope you enjoy it — i suppose Percy Jackson really is timeless :-)

He has known Katie Gardner since they were eleven. As a child, she often wore her hair in two braids, and immediately took a liking to the Demeter cabin’s strawberry patch - he can still remember her going around camp urging everyone to try some strawberries. He had taken one from her basket, innocuous and wanting to know what that strange, dotted red fruit tasted like. It had tasted good.

But he also remembers that Katie wouldn’t let him take another, lest there wasn’t enough to go around camp.

And when both of them approached adolescence, Katie put an end to the braids. Travis found himself missing the braids, despite only having seen them from afar. He wanted to run up to her and demand she bring the braids back.

But he didn’t. Of course. Because Katie was the kind of person he’d nod to when they passed, and he’d only really say hi if he saw her outside camp. Their lives were completely separate.

Travis Stoll looks over to the Demeter cabin, where many improvements have been made. More plants, obviously. Bright flowers, and also vines. Vines with thorns serve as a defence in case anyone tries to trespass into the cabin. At least, that’s what Katie, cabin counsellor, says the thorns are for. Everyone really knows they’re to keep the Stoll brothers out. And everyone thinks they work.

But Connor thinks the Demeter cabin is a little late on prevention measures. The brothers have already chosen a new target - one of the recently added cabins, the Iris cabin. They carry their plan out in broad daylight, but Travis, the quicker of the two, sneaks not the cabin and swaps out the skittles they’ve got for M&Ms. It seems mild. But M&Ms are no joke to the Iris kids, and to top it all off, all the M&Ms are a single colour.

Connor only shakes his head. “This was a badly thought-through prank,” he states, “because I didn’t come up with it.”

Travis only shakes his head in mirth. “It’s still fun, right?”

*

Far from his usual schedule of pranking and pillaging, Travis finds himself wandering to the Demeter cabin’s fields. Strictly, they aren’t their fields, but the Demeter kids are often the only ones there patiently tending to the plants.

He’s only strolling when he hears an angry shout: “Hey! Stoll! Get out!”

It’s Katie. She’s wearing a sunhat, and has her hair scraped back in a messy ponytail. Trowel in one hand, menacingly pointed to Travis, and watering can in the other, she certainly takes her role as a daughter of Demeter seriously.

Travis points this observation out. “You look very threatening like that.” He turns away and continues walking.

She only huffs, rolling her eyes. “You don’t belong here. Just get out of here and let us work. Regardless of whatever prank you have up your sleeve, the camp still has to eat, you know.”

Travis gives a cheeky smile in reply and saunters off. But not off the field - he watches the Demeter kids tend to the plants. Each camper has a patch they attend to, and Katie tends to the strawberries.

He watches when she tenderly runs her fingers along the bottom of the plants’ leaves, when she murmurs to them, when she allows a soft smile to slip onto her face. She makes gardening seem rewarding when the plant shoots up a little.

Travis shuffles away, but can’t help looking back over his shoulder, wondering about that smile. He hadn’t known Katie could smile like that.

 He ends up strolling through the rest of the field, under the guise of checking the area out, but his eyes are trained on Katie and her strawberry the whole time.

It is an hour later or so when Katie trudges up to him and frowns. “Why’re you still here?”

He laughs. “Just… wondering why you’d bother salvaging this patch of dirt. Was about to leave, but I can stay if you’d like.”

“You’re insufferable,” she mutters.

He just shrugs, and thinks that this is cue to leave, but leaves these parting words: “Put your hair in braids more. Your hair got really messy in that ponytail.”

She doesn’t reply.

*

The next time he speaks to Katie Gardner is after the Titan war. He approaches her in the midst of the aftermath. The infirmary is flooded and cabins are half-empty, and she’s sitting alone, forlorn, in her cabin.

“Where’s everyone else?” He asks, gesturing to the huge empty space.

“Some of them are injured. Some of them are… missing. But, you know. It doesn’t matter, because Percy Jackson’s saved everyone.”

A wry smile plays on his lips. “I understand. He’s a decent guy, but does he really think a promise will make the gods change? The Hermes cabin is so empty. Everyone has either died for Kronos or died for us.” He settles down next to her on her bed and stares ahead.

The aftermath is worse than the actual battle, because the gravity of everything finally sinks in.

“We’ve got shrouds to prepare, bodies to retrieve…” Katie lists things off.

“Stop trying to hang on to your sensibility.”

“I have to! I have to, to make up for the lack of sense _some_ campers possess — trying to rob a candy store in the middle of war?”

“It was a good time! And you know we weren’t really needed.”

“And trying to steal mortals’ phones, when we can’t even use them?”

“We could’ve sold the phones. Then you Demeter kids could sit back and relax for a few months - no need to grow strawberries any more.”

“I enjoy growing strawberries!”

“And I enjoy stealing!”

“Fine!”

“Fine!”

“Get out of my cabin,” she slumps, and it’s back to before he stepped in.

He’s infuriated, yet he just sits there. And she sits next to him. Both are unperturbed by the other’s presence, though both face away from each other. Travis keeps glancing back at Katie, because to him, it’s so surreal. He just wants to sit there for a long, long time.

He turns to face her after a while. Her face is pinched. He knows she’s worried — anyone could tell, of course — so he reaches over and wraps his arms around her. “It’s all going to be fine,” he murmurs.

“I know it is, idiot,” she replies, but it doesn’t have a much bite as it should. Plus, she doesn’t pull away.

*

Somehow, after the war, the whole lot of old campers grow closer. It’s an abrupt process, because suddenly Travis and Connor talk a whole lot more to Annabeth, Clarisse cools down and is actually a decent person (how did Chris do that?), and most importantly, Travis finds himself speaking with Katie.

His pranks have cooled, too. Of course he still appreciates a good prank, but Connor has been pushing him to prank more. It used to be the other way around. Now, he has more important things to do. Like see Katie Gardner tend to her plants.

Another interesting development: Travis finds himself wandering to the fields so often, the other Demeter kids - most of them newer campers, anyway - don’t even look surprised when he shows up, even though he’s always the only one with pristine (or at least unsoiled — clothing.

Katie finishes watering her strawberry plants, and is about to move on to her other adopted fruits like watermelons when she stops, eyes sliding over to him.

Travis knows she’s seen him, so he goes forward to greet her.

“What’re you doing here?” She sounds tired, but not unwelcoming.

“Nothing much. Just wanted to see you guys working. It’s amusing, and I’m free.”

“You mean you came to see me?”

“No.” His response is too quick, too sharp.

“Aren’t yo supposed to be good at lying? You don’t even know the names of the other Demeter kids, do you?” She shakes her head. “I never thought I would say this, but it’s nice to have you here — even if you’re watching me like a creep. But why don’t you make yourself useful? Take a watering can and water the watermelons for me.”

He does as she says. It turns out that he does not have a plant thing, because five days later Katie comes to tell him that the plants he watered are suffering from root rot, and how much water did he even give those plants?

Katie ignores him for a few days because of the watermelons, but soon Travis dares to go to the fields again and demand that her hair be in braids again and watch her in his free time again.

*

“You’ve been spending more time alone than with me,” Connor informs Travis crossly. “The last time we did anything remotely fun was two months ago, and that wasn’t even a huge success. What’s happened?”

“Nothing’s happened, Connor — I’ve been a little distracted.”

Connor peers at him with his lips set in a thin line for a few moments. “I can tell.” He leaves the cabin.

He’s about to head out of his cabin as well when, to his surprise, Katie is standing outside. “May I come in?” Her voice is soft.

Travis finds himself nodding. “Sure.”

“I’m finally free,” she announces.

“So?”

“You seem free too.”

“I have to go in like, three minutes.”

“Oh.”

“But, I mean, tonight? After dinner?”

Somehow, seeing Katie disappointed spurred him to say that.

“The woods?” Katie looks so hopeful he agrees without a second thought.

“Of course you’d want to meet at the woods. Sure.”

Both are silent. Travis takes this opportunity to turn his head to his right and look.

He _really_ looks at her, who’s still gazing straight ahead. She’s really brown. Brown hair, brown eyes. Just as tanned as he is, but they’re tanned for different reasons. She’s been burnt by the sun because she has plants to care for. The brown reminds Travis of hot chocolate, warm and calming.

At the same time Katie looks a lot like Demeter often chooses to appear: austere, determined, and terribly plain.

“What’re you looking at?” She questions offhandedly, her head still facing straight.

Travis doesn’t turn away, though. “You.”

He stands up to leave. “Have to go for practice. Bye, Katie. See you tonight?”

He’s already out the door when she replies. “See you tonight.”

*

Travis is in the woods right after dinner. He practically tripped over himself getting there, and he’d never rushed for something like that before. He wanders around for a while, wondering if he’s too early or if Katie is late, if Katie stood him up, or found something more important to do, when Katie strolls right up to him. She’s wearing a dirty camp shirt and jeans as usual. So is he.

It’s funny how many orange camp shirts he owns. They must take up more than half of his entire wardrobe, and the other half is probably jeans.

“Why here?” Travis can’t help but ask Katie.

“I don’t know. I know Demeter’s just the goddess of agriculture, and technically forest doesn’t count, but I just feel at ease with plants. Plants, nature - they can’t hurt me. People can. Some people are simply irritating, too.”

Travis laughs at that. “It takes one to know one, huh? Katie, you aren't so far off the chart.”

“I’d say that to you, Travis, and it’d make a whole lot more sense.”

“I’ll let you know that I’m terribly offended.”

“Shut up and let’s walk.”  
So they walk. Well, Travis walks, and Katie grows maybe a hundred plants with every step she takes.

“Katie,” he breathes out when she’s coaxed a yellowing sapling to turn green and grow again, “you bring them life.”

She nods.

He watches in silence again when she continues to work her literal magic, but soon stops.

“Travis. Stop staring.” Her voice quivers almost imperceptibly, the way a leaf barely shivers in the night.

“What?” Travis blinks out of the reverie he slipped into, immediately regretting the daydream he had slipped into like a fool.

Katie seemingly concentrates on the current plants. “Just stop. Please just stop staring at me - especially not like _that_. Not - ”

She cuts her sentence.

“Like what?” He knows his eyes are boring holes in Katie, and in an instant he’s placed his hands on Katie’s shoulders and he’s forced her to face him. “Like what?”

Her eyes remain interested on the forest floor, and Travis is suddenly hyper-aware of their proximity. Also, he wants to lean down and bury his nose in her hair.

“Like I’m so fascinating and interesting. Like I’m so great to watch. Like… like you care.” She murmurs, speaking more to a plant than to Travis.

Travis doesn’t know where this is going, only that his heart beats more erratically than when he’s on a pranking high.

So he replies, maybe a little dumbly: “Yeah.”

He stumbles over his words fixing that statement. “I mean — yeah, you’re interesting. I do — I do care. About you.”

He realises he _does_ care about Katie when he says that, albeit disproportionately. So he leans down, and as much as he hates to admit it, even though he’s been quite sought after by the naiads and nymphs and Aphrodite girls, he’s refused every single one. He doesn’t know the first thing to this.

His lips meet hers and it’s strange. They just stay there for a few moments.

It’s such a clumsy kiss. They break away. “Travis. You’re so annoying. How did you manage to charm your way into my life when I already —”

“Stop.” Travis cuts her off. He swoops down to capture her lips again, and for all her bossiness, she doesn’t protest.

But then she pushes him off.

“Let me finish! When you were eleven, and I was eleven, and I first saw you, you were the cutest thing ever. Curly hair. Wicked smile. Sparkly eyes. So I didn’t talk to you, because I didn’t want any distractions. Also Mom told me not to talk to you, but anyway.”

“Katie! I knew you’d set your sights on me since young. You, to your credit, were irresistible with braids.”

“Then we grew up, but not like Percy and Annabeth. They grew closer. We only grew apart. You kept annoying me with your immature pranks, but every time I shouted at you I felt like it was an excuse to talk to you. Worse, I thought I needed an excuse to talk to you.”

“Katie.” The word is enough. They lapse into a silence as they walk back, but Katie doesn’t let go or move away when Travis catches her hand in his halfway. When they reach the Demeter cabin, he tells her, “Good night, Katie.”

She tiptoes only a little, and brushes her lips against his. He wonders for a second where he is when she does that.

That night, he only dreams of Katie Gardner. The only girl who’s successfully managed to steal something from right under his nose, and it had to be his heart.


End file.
